Gabriela Gentile

Entrepreneurial Design 2015-16

[gentiledesign]

Final Thoughts _ EPD

This entrepreneurial design class was a great asset to my construction as a designer. I always knew that I would like to start my own business, however it’s really hard to do everything by your own without some guidance. This class provided us , students, so many great examples of amazing designers sharing their path and thoughts with us about what really is to be an entrepreneur. Knowing their struggle and their challenges as well as their success it really inspired me personally to really be an entrepreneur. Also , being able to put yourself out in the world, with such an amazing tool as Kickstarter, was an awesome experience. 

This second semester, for me personally was a little more challenging than the first one, having to deal with all the sourcing, production an shipping in such a short period was really challenging. But overall, I was able to balance everything and finalize in time.

I want to thank Craighton for bring so many amazing people into the classroom to inspire us to create our own entrepreneurial path. I really feel, after this year long class, that I really am able to create my own business and be an independent designer.

[craightonberman]

Throwing a little studio social for my students today because they’re true hustlers (at Craighton Berman Studio)

[gentiledesign]

Production has started!

I’m happy to say that this weekend I finally started my first batch of my Kickstarter project!

Seems like everything is going to be on schedule! I’m really happy to finally bring this project to life! Thanks to my amazing backers who helped me!

[gentiledesign]

Production Update

L O C U S first production batch will start tomorrow! This week I've got all the materials that I need, and tomorrow I'm going to start my first batch! Couldn't be more excited ! For the next few weeks, my plan is to finalise everything and be on schedule! Initially my plan was to ship everything by May for my Kickstarters backers and seems like everything will be on schedule ! I will be posting some behind the scenes on the blog really soon.

[gentiledesign]

kickstarter update

My Kickstarter campaign is doing better than I ever imagined. With the help of my amazing backers my project successfully reached the goal in only 3 days!!! After a few days, I decided to open more rewards since the ones that I had initially were all gone! Now, the project is currently 291% funded and still have 10 days to go. So far this experience was great for me and I will definitely would use Kickstarter again for some future project in a larger scale. But we still have a few more days to go , let’s see what’s going to happen! 

[gentiledesign]

Experience Institute - Design your Education

During our class this past week we visited the Experience Institute here at Chicago and had a really great talk with Victor Saad , founder of the program.

With the this program they are trying to create a new type of Higher Education based on experience, through apprenticeships, self-guided projects, meetups, and coaching, they create a space within higher education that helps individuals build creative confidence, agency, and a compelling portfolio. It’s a really interesting way of gaining experience through this new methodology. Everything began when Victor decided that he was gonna take one year off for a self-made Masters Program based on apprenticeship and experience, a project that he named a Leap Year. The result of this year of experience ended up as a book that was featured at Kickstarter. With the help of 342 backers the project successfully raised $31,049.

Inspired by that experience that he have, he had a question in mind : How might we establish experience as a creative form of learning? So he developed this new type of education that provides transformative lessons and costs far less than current models. During our conversation he gave us some incredible advices , such as things that are really relevant in the market as interdisciplinary competencies like :    - Self Awareness - Storytelling - Community Building - Operations - Human Centered design.  

After establishing the Experience Institute, he also wanted to provide some part of what is offered in the Institute for a much broad audience for a less expensive value. So, Also using Kickstarter he successfully funded with the help of 588 backers  and raising $49,736, the Leap Kit to support individuals interested in learning something new, navigating their career and/or taking a path other than traditional higher education. 

A great idea that also helped to promote the Experience Institute with the community . It was truly inspiring to see all of that.

“Those who design their education will design their future”

[gentiledesign]

Gramovox

Last week we met the Gramovox team at their office where we talked with Pava Bapu , one of the co-founders of the company. They are a consumer electronics start-up that reimagines vintage audio design with modern technology . They used Kickstarter to launch their product, a bluetooth gramophone where they successfully raised $241,173 .

In their second campaign , with the floating record they reached the incredible mark of  $1,575,976 dollars . 

Besides being able to see their incredible products, we discussed business with them and the best advice that he gave us was how to stay positive through the difficulties that may occur during the project , and also the importance to reach out for investors.  Thanks Gramovox team to being able to share your experience with our class.

[gentiledesign]

A couple weeks ago, our class had an incredible conversation with Max Temkin, one of the creators of Cards against Humanity, Secret Hitler and other awesome games. We met him at his workspace, an incredible space . He shared with us his experience with his Kickstarter campaigns and how Kickstarter was a game changing at his business, after all the success that he had with his first campaign, he was able to expand his business and create this amazing workspace. It was really amazing to see how a platform like Kickstarter created a range of new opportunities for Max and his business. Thanks for your time Max, it was truly inspiring!

[always-be-hustling]

Kickstarter Curated Page

We have a curated page as well: https://www.kickstarter.com/pages/EPD

[andiekimura]

So awesome! Thanks Kickstarter and Craighton!

[gentiledesign]

Check it out!!

[gentiledesign]

Wow! This is awesome! Thanks Kickstarter!! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/gabrielagentile/l-o-c-u-s

[always-be-hustling]

Looks like a bunch of people scrolling through Facebook. It’s actually a bunch of people pressing the green launch button on their Kickstarter campaigns, throwing their ideas out into the unknown void, taking calculated leaps of faith, and pushing their dreams that much closer to reality.

[gentiledesign]

L O C U S

A place to remember.An elegant and practical solution to small object organization that also functions as decorative piece in your home

I’m happy to announce that L O C U S has finally launched!!! 

[always-be-hustling]

More than Just Making — Announcing the 2016 UIC Industrial Design Student Kickstarter Campaigns!

[POST IN PROGRESS] 

The maker movement has done amazing things to allow anyone to bring their ideas to life. The access to automated manufacturing tools, shared workshops, and communities to support making is at an all time high. It’s an amazing time to be a maker. But making is just the first step to experiencing entrepreneurship.

As part of a year long “Entrepreneurial Product Development” (EPD) course at the University of Illinois at Chicago, 18 design students have launched their first Kickstarter campaigns for products they have designed. The class is taught by Craighton Berman, a designer that has launched 4 projects on the platform.

The EPD course is framed as a year long immersion in “design-entrepreneurship”—a type of entrepreneurship that puts emphasis on ideas and making to create and launch products. More can be read about the source in the class syllabus and on the class blog.

Last semester was framed around the concept of “CREATE”—the students defined, designed, and sourced their products, and then worked to create their campaign. Each week we spoke with a guest designer (via Skype and in-person studio visits) to learn about their experiences first hand. Guests last semester included —-. This semester is themed “SCALE”, and is focused on the next level of design entrepreneurship, and will feature guests from Cards against Humanity, Gramovox, Strand Design, The Experience Institute, Kickstarter HQ—and many notable guests to come.

The most exciting news of all is that the students have all finalized and launched their campaigns on February 4th 2016, and will be running them through March 4th 2016. 

The 18 projects range from limited edition handmade objects to limited run mass production, but all projects have each individual student running every aspect of their campaign. With much excitement I present the project links:

Sara Ramirez - Niche

Nick Greenen - Poise

Steven Krejcik - Weathered Notebooks

Ric Salazar - Link Capo

Hamsel De La Cruz - Muse Pencil Case

Andie Kimura - ___Shift : image frame

Patty Stalonczyk - B2 Wall Binder

Paulina Kordek - Salad Serving Set

Letícia Alcará - Volta

Jose Mota - Meem

Gabriela Gentile - L O C U S

Ashley Villagrana - Petmego

Maribel López - Yager

Ruggero Gonzalez - Ório One

Alexander Cruz - Super Saturn

Peter Graff - Curb Stone (coming soon)

Gabe Chorabik - PUCA Tool (coming soon)

Ryan Blackmon - CHOP (coming soon)

[gentiledesign]

L O C U S  - pr

Hey everyone! My Name is Gabriela Gentile and I am a Design Student, currently studying abroad at University of Illinois at Chicago. During this past year studying at UIC, I could learn and experience so much more about Design, and specifically about Entrepreneur Design. In our entrepreneurial design class, each student developed a product to be launched on Kickstarter this semester and I developed LOCUS. 

The meaning of the word LOCUS comes from Latin, which means a central or main place where something happens or is found. With five different designs, the product is more than just a magnetic surface is an item that you can personalize the way that you want to, where it can be used to display and store your objects, pictures, notes and etc. It’s a place where you are always finding what it matters right before your eyes, a place to remember.

Developing this product, I was able to combine my passion to create beautifully crafted products with my entrepreneur side, launching this as my first independent project facing every steps of its creation,funding through shipping. I hope you enjoyed LOCUS and this could be something that you can share with your community!      

LOCUS will be launched on Kickstarter soon!

Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions.

You can see all of the other campaigns at http://always-be-hustling.tumblr.com/kck2016.

Best Regards,

Gabriela Gentile 

[email protected] Undergraduate at University of Illinois at Chicago  http://gentiledesign.tumblr.com

[gentiledesign]

Ted Burdett

Hey everyone! Last week in our class he had the pleasure to talk with one of our faculty members and really talented designer Ted Burdett, from Strand Design. I felt that he was very passionated about what he does for a living, what is really inspirational. He talked to us about us as designers we are constantly challenged to came up with solutions, and there’s no mystery: we have to look around us. 

For me, the most interesting part of the talk was when he talked about the process of his Kickstarter campaign for Forneau .

The Fourneau Bread Oven is a cast iron bakeware device that will help you make artisanal quality bread in your home oven. An Idea that he and his wife and partner at the Design Studio discussed for years before launching at Kickstarter. The most interesting part of conversation was to see that everyone can face some difficulties, like he did with the manufactures , and the best thing to do is always be honest with your backers.

Another important thing is to know well your target market and get credibility out there. 

For example he tested his prototype at one very respectful bakery of Chicago and also reached out for blogs, magazines and trade shows, and once he had launched his project at Kickstarter, he already had a network of potential backers for his product. The result could not be different, Forneau was a successfully funded project. Thanks for taking the time for our class Ted!

[gentiledesign]

Martin Kastner

Last class, we had the pleasure to watch a lecture by Martin Kastner, the founder of Crucial Detail, where he talked about his work and his career as a designer. I’ve got confess that I was really impressed with his work, it’s such a original path and I was truly amazed by the results of his work, exploring the synergy between food and design.

I didn’t knew that this kind of job existed and how much effort was involved to create such an amazing experience for the customer. The food that he created is so inventive and so unique that they literally had to design tools just so people could consume it.

Another really interesting part of our talk was when he mentioned the experience of creating a Kickstarter project, The Porthole.

The Porthole, it’s a drink infusion vessel that can be used to infuse cocktails, oils, teas, dressings and coffee and is constructed of a pivoting food-grade Delrin frame with the body constructed with low-iron glass. All of the hardware, including the filter screens, is constructed with stainless steel. It was really interesting and truly inspiring to watch this lecture and admire the originality of his work, Thanks for the talk Martin!

[gentiledesign]

CW & T

A couple weeks ago, our class had the pleasure to talk with Chei-We Wang and Taylor Levy from CW&T Studio, an Art & Design Studio. I thought that this part of their mission statement in their website was really interesting :

“We design for one. We firmly believe the most passionate and thoughtful designs are designed for an individual. If it’s super fine-tuned for one person, it’ll be unconventional, desirable and super-practical (at least for one person). But, surely there are thousands and maybe millions of others out there that will also appreciate the weird thing that we thought was good for just one”

I feel that this really fulfill the impression that I had of then in our talk, and it really connects with the thought that they said that was better to have 100 loyal fans than a 10000 of mediocre fans. It was really nice to talk with two people so open about their challenges and risks as entrepreneur designers. 

They talked about how was the production and challenges for this beautiful Kickstarter project Pen Type-A.

Pen Type-A is a minimal pen and ruler sleeve made for Hi-Tec-C ink cartridges. All of its parts are machined out of solid stainless steel and the sleeve is laser engraved with ruler markings.The production of this pen was supported for 4,049 backers and was successfully crowd-funded on August 15, 2011 making it the 6th most funded project on Kickstarter. They started to manufacture the product in China were they produced 6.000 Pen Type-A, but now, due to some problems with manufacturers, the production it’s made in Vermont, USA.

I really enjoyed how they were completely opened up about their difficulties, not only to us, but also for their clients in their Website. So, the most important lesson that I took from this conversation is: Be honest! As an independent designer, honesty is such an essential characteristic in order to gain the loyalty of your clients when you are building your brand. Thanks for taking the time for this talk guys, I’ve learned a lot from it!